Origin of The Frug
by Brad Beckstrom
Hi I’m Brad AKA The Frug. I was given the nickname “The Frug” by my beautiful wife Kelly. She writes about celebrities, makeup, and fashion on her blog kellysuperficial.com. Sometimes she uses her blog to complain about me and my frugal ways!
I think she’s got at least 100 blog posts that mention “The Frug.” Anyway, I thought, “why do I deserve this nickname?” By all appearances, we are certainly not that frugal. In fact, I believe we spend more than most families on what I call “family T&E” or as Kelly calls it “Family Fun Time.” (I think she is being sarcastic, but what do I know?) It’s our biggest budget item. This blog is mostly about our journey from spending on “stuff” to saving, adventure, and financial independence.
Regardless, the name “The Frug” stuck so I decided to really start living it. A few years ago, I registered the domain name “thefrug.com” but never got around to starting the blog as I was too busy dealing with, you guessed it, “stuff.” I think when most people hear the word frugal they think of a penny-pinching coupon clipping recluse. I’d like to redefine the term.
Let’s start with the Wikipedia definition of frugality:
Frugality is the quality of being frugal, sparing, thrifty, prudent or economical in the use of consumable resources such as food, time or money, and avoiding waste, lavishness or extravagance.
I like to think of it this way Frugality = Less and Less = More. So this blog is really about enjoying life more by consuming less. Especially less stuff.
The formula is pretty simple, by consuming less we free up time and money to spend on life’s experiences, instead of stuff. And if we can develop lean spending habits for travel, for work, and for life in general, everyone benefits. I’ve been working on this for years and I want to encourage people to join me and learn how to live lean. I also want to share everything I’ve learned in my journey towards financial independence. As Warren Buffett demonstrates frugal is not cheap.
Primarily this blog will be about improving your personal economy and enjoyment of life. Many personal finance blogs spend a lot of time focused on the economy, the stock market, and the general insanity of the day-to-day world of finance. That’s not for us. We know we have no control over that and most of the advice is contradictory or flat out wrong.
My goal is to guide you towards financial independence through proven actionable advice, so you can be free from worrying about the news, the market, and your 401K balance. This blog will focus on three areas.
Living Lean – Actionable advice on spending less, enjoying life more. Helping readers plan their journey to financial independence.
Working Lean – I’ll be talking about checking out of the rat race and creating your own entrepreneurial adventure. We will explore how to work from anywhere, fund your adventures, and find the best tools for independent and creative work.
Traveling Lean – Traveling is always been a passion of mine. I’ll share some of the best travel hacks, tips and creative ideas. And also dive into the challenges of traveling as a family of four.
You can get started by clicking on any of the categories above to see the latest posts by topic. If you’d like my posts delivered via email simply sign up at the top of the page.
Enjoy,
The Frug.
Follow me on Twitter Facebook Flickr Instagram
Contact The Frug